by Amy Faye
I turn, and I screw up my face and tighten my jaw and stand up straight, and I get ready for what's about to come, because I've been dealing with Margaret for almost half a year now, and I'm about ready to give mini-Mags a piece of my mind.
28
Nia's expression is fierce. I can feel old habits dying hard inside me, a little voice telling me that it'd be so easy to just walk away, and never come back. As easy as anything. But I'm the one with the ring around my finger.
And yet, she ignores me, breezes past and grabs Blake. She looks like she's about ready to fuck him right there in the lobby. But I'm not going to let that happen.
So I grab her, whirl her around. "What are you doing here, Nia?"
"What do you think I'm doing? I'm cleaning up your mess. I'm making things work out right again. Blake is my man, and I'm taking him home with me."
I want to slap her right in the face. I hold myself back. For now. I keep the idea in my back pocket just in case she decides to keep pushing and I get to the point where I can't fucking take it any more.
"He's my man now. I'm sure you're not used to men saying no to you, but he's not interested. Now get out of here before I have to make things get ugly."
I can feel the eyes of the entire lobby on me. Somewhere behind me, a half-dozen people are speaking Russian, and I have no idea what they're saying, but I don't imagine it's good.
"You think you can make me?"
"Of course I can make you," I growl. "But I'm not planning on trying. I'm planning on you walking right out that door, and going to get some other guy wrapped around your finger. Maybe, one day, you'll realize that there's more to life than what you can get with just your pussy, but until that happens, have a good life and get the fuck out of mine."
Nia looks at me for a long moment. Deciding whether or not she's going to take it. Measuring her own response. Then she seems to settle. Her mood evens out, and she's back to exactly who she's always been. A stupid, petulant bitch who thinks that she's going to win every fight she gets into.
She opens her mouth, and my hand moves before I even have time to think about how bad an idea it is. Of course, I probably would have done it anyways, but at least now I feel bad about what I've done. My hand moves hard and fast and catches her across the mouth.
The look on her face is exactly what I'd hoped it would be. Shock and awe and anger. There's no part of her whose feelings are so hurt that she's going to walk away now. She's digging in her heels.
In another world, I would have to look up to her. Nia's got a lot to teach me. She's a strong woman, and if I had one ounce of her strength, my life would have been a lot easier up til now. But I'm not going to let her take my man, and I'm not going to back down now that I've learned my lesson, just so it will make her feel better.
"Listen, you…" I slap her again, and her anger multiplies by a hundred. This time she doesn't bother opening her mouth to speak at all. Her lip pulls back in a furious snarl and she leaps at me. I turn her over my hip, but then I lose my balance and topple over on top of her.
Her hands are reaching for my hair from the first instant. See, girls don't throw punches very well. We're small, we're fragile, and there are so many bigger people in the world. A woman has to get used to losing fights real quick, if she tries to fight like a man.
So a woman's natural inclination is to fight dirty. She digs her fingers into my hair and pulls. I'm not used to this. I don't like fighting. But I'm angry enough to do what I have to do. So I jam my finger between her teeth and her cheek and pull hard. She lets out a shriek and pulls away.
There's only a moment before she can readjust and come at me again, but in that moment a dozen men in unbuttoned suits come between us to separate the pair of us and pull us aside. Blake steps in, starts speaking Russian at a mile a minute, and eventually we all manage to get out without being arrested right there on the first night of my honeymoon.
But I'll say this: bitch deserved it, and she's not going to come after my man again. Or I'll fish-hook her again in a heartbeat.
The phones stay off, and true to his word, we don't have to leave our suite. For the better part of the first week, we don't. The second week was a little better; I got to see a half-dozen cathedrals, which were amazing. Museums for days. I could have spent a whole year in the Hermitage museum alone, but we fit the trip into a day.
And then it was a long, long flight home, with a little bit less marital distraction from Blake. Then again, it was a red-eye so I got to sleep a little bit.
I'm not surprised when we land, Blake turns on his phone, and he has a dozen messages waiting for him. I'm even less surprised when all I have of my own messages are a handful of texts from Hollie and Alina, asking where we went and telling me to 'go get him, girl.' That's actually the tamest one. Apparently, when they'd decided to go nuts texting me, at least one of them had been drinking, and came up with some very specific ideas for what sort of sex acts a new couple should be performing.
From the look on Blake's face as he listened to his messages, someone else had some very specific ideas, too. I don't like to eavesdrop, but I do it anyway. I want to know what is upsetting him.
It's Margaret's voice on his phone. I know that right away. And then I hear what's pissing him off so much. I don't catch all of it, but what I caught was enough. 'Airheaded bimbo' makes an appearance, alongside 'divorce' and then a moment later, 'disown.'
And Blake's face, in spite of himself, is worried.
29
I hold my breath as Blake pulls the phone away from his head and pushes a button on his phone. A mechanical voice on the other end says 'Message marked for deletion.' Then he puts the phone back to his ear for exactly two seconds before he pulls it back off and hits the button to end the call and stuffs the phone back in his pocket angrily.
"You okay, babe?"
He looks at me and for a moment I think he might even be angry with me. Then he thinks better of it. "It's nothing. My mother."
"Is everything alright?"
"She's just being… well, she's just being herself, I guess. She's just got a natural irresistible charm. You know all about it, I'm sure."
"Yeah, well. She's your mother. I'm not going to trash talk her in front of you."
"Oh, please," he says, looking at me out of the side of his eye. "I'm not an idiot. I know exactly what you think of her."
"Which is why I'm going to keep my mouth shut." I wink. I can be very diplomatic when there's nothing left to say.
"Yeah, that makes sense, I guess." He lets out a long, low breath. "Just frustrated."
"I'm sure that everything's going to be fine."
"Yeah, I'm sure they will. Just as long as nobody tries to talk to me about this."
We made our way off the plane, near the tail end, when we had plenty of time to unpack the overhead compartment and get out without being in everyone's way.
Being in a country where I spoke the language was almost odd, after all that time. Like my new 'normal' was being in a bubble where three quarters of what I hear is incomprehensible. It's strange to hear every sentence and understand it. To know that people are making plans for dinner, or, for example, talking shit about their mothers in law.
There's something comforting about it, and yet, something awfully mundane. And when we climb into Blake's car, it roars to life, and then we start driving, the mundane stuff comes crashing down on my head.
"We should start talking about the baby."
"Okay? What about it?"
"Do you think it would be smart to have one of us at home to watch the family?"
"I'm sorry?"
"I just think it makes more sense than hiring a babysitter, you know? Less impersonal. A child should grow up with their parents. Not distant from them. I know too much about that as it is."
"And you're suggesting I ought to be the one to do it?"
He lets out a breath and works his hands on the wheel, like he needs to get a better grip. I know better than to
believe that. He's annoyed, and sure. He has every right to be annoyed. But I have every right to my own life, too. I don't have to do whatever he wants just because he's got a right to his opinion.
"You don't want to?"
"I love you, and I really don't want to upset you. But I'm not quitting my job. We'll have to figure something else out."
He goes quiet. I wonder for a moment if this is going to be the first real fight of the marriage, and only ten minutes after we get back from the honeymoon.
"You're sure?"
"I've been working to get that museum job since I was twelve, Blake. I'm so excited to have a child, I can't even see straight. But I'm not going to walk away from my goals so that I can have a child. I'm just not going to, and I'm sorry if that's upsetting."
There's a long silence again before he responds. He's usually overdoing it. If he goes, it's overboard. But now he's just quiet, thinking.
"I understand."
For a moment I'm almost flabbergasted by it. I'd spent so long bracing for him to get mad at me that I don't really know how to respond to acceptance.
"It's fine?"
"It's not fine," he says. Then he shrugs. "But you're right. You've worked hard to get where you are. I'd be a real dick if I forced you to give it up. So we'll figure it out. We'll make it work."
I probably shouldn't distract him while he's driving, but I can't help myself. I lean over and press a kiss into his cheek.
"I really appreciate it." I feel like I'm still downplaying how thankful I am that this didn't go how I was fearing. He wouldn't have been wrong to push me, but I won't be pushed. That's how a fight starts, and fights about kids are the big ones. It's hard to imagine how bad things could have gotten if they'd gotten even a little bit out of hand.
"I know, I'm a saint." His phone rings. He leans his hip up off the seat. "You want to get that? See who it is."
I reach into his pocket, which he seems to enjoy the hell out of, and I won't deny that I enjoy it myself.
"It's your mother," I tell him, as I look at it. The smile that had spread across his face fades in an instant.
"I'm not taking any calls from mother today, thanks."
"You're sure?"
"I'm one hundred percent sure."
I click the button to hang up with a sense of satisfaction that I hope doesn't show on my face. Then I drop the phone into a cup holder, and we keep driving. We're getting close to home, now, and then there's going to be forever and a half of unpacking and putting clothes back away.
But I'm looking forward to it, at this point. I'd like to be back home. To be able to relax, even if it's just for a little while.
The worst sound I've ever heard fills the car, like a thousand nails on a thousand chalkboards. "Jesus, what was that?"
It comes again and I realize it's the sound of the phone rattling just wrong against the wall of the cup holder.
"Just ignore it," Blake says. I pick the phone up anyways, hoping to get another chance to hang up on Margaret.
"Uh, babe?"
He looks over at me for an instant, and then back at the road. "What's up?"
"It's your dad."
He stiffens in an instant, and then lets out a breath, long and slow. "Okay, then. It's probably Margaret, but I've got to take it."
I hit the button to answer, and Blake pulls off to the side of the road and takes the phone from me and steps out of the car. I can only imagine how he feels, because my heart is thumping a million miles an hour, and he looks as terrified as I feel.
30
There's a long pause, before Blake starts speaking. I don't know if I'm supposed to be able to hear it; I assume I'm not. But that doesn't mean that I don't want to hear it, and if I want to hear it then you bet your ass that I will. And the truth is, with the message that Margaret left, I'm not sure that I can afford to just let them talk.
If they want us divorced then there's nothing much I can do about that. I've accepted that. But I don't want to sit here and wait in the clutch. So, for better or worse, I get out right alongside him, and I lean up against the side of the car. And then I wait for something to happen.
It's too far for me to hear, but I don't know what Anatoly's saying. I know that he married Margaret, though, and that they've been married a long time. There are a thousand reasons people can stay together, but they have to be compatible somehow, or it just doesn't really work. I like Anatoly, and I don't like Margaret, but somewhere along the line, he thought that he liked her.
The question is, at what point does the friend of your enemy become your enemy? I don't know where he draws the line, but I know that having his father order Blake to get a divorce is a completely different question than his mother ordering him.
He looks over at me, and he's worried. Hell, I'm worried. He gives me a halfway smile, but it's remarkably unhelpful. At the end of it I still feel like I'm going to be sick. And then the smile fades again in an instant, and I'm going to be even more sick because he can't even keep up the act.
There's another long silence, except for the sound of the cars roaring by and every few moments, Blake saying "yeah," or "okay."
Then he looks at me again, long and hard, and for the first time I get the impression that he's actually going to say something meaningful, rather than just letting his father know he's listening. And he does. He says one word.
"No."
I can see the fear in his eyes. He's afraid of what's going to happen when he says it. He's afraid of what his father's going to do to him. He's not half as afraid as I am, but he's definitely afraid, I can't deny that.
He goes back to listening for a moment, and I think there's going to be a lengthy lecture. But there isn't. A moment later, he gets a confused expression, but he doesn't ask any questions. He pulls the phone away, pushes a button with his thumb, and walks over.
"Are you on speaker?"
"You're on speaker, Dad," Blake says. I realize suddenly that I'd underestimated how scared he must have been. Because I was scared before, and now that I'm on the phone with his father, I feel like I'm about to pee my pants.
"How was your honeymoon, sweetheart?"
"It was good," I tell him.
"I'm glad to hear that," he says. I worry about it. I worry that there might be a reason that he's not getting to the point. "So I hear that Margaret's been leaving you some very nasty messages."
Blake's eyes flash for a moment. "I'm not going to leave her, Dad, no matter what Margaret says."
"I understand that. You told me already. I may be old, but I'm not senile, boy. You'd do well to keep that in mind."
"You're right, I'm sorry, father."
"Now, about that."
I hold my breath. I don't know how long of a pause there is, but it's not brief, and each instant feels like an eternity.
"You don't have to worry about being written out of the will. I made sure to check with my people before I called, but there's no way that Margaret can cut you out, okay? So there's no worries there."
The money doesn't matter. We don't need it, not desperately. But that doesn't mean that I wasn't worried about it. It doesn't mean that I didn't want Blake to stay in the will.
"Thank you," Blake says. He seems to be trying to hide his relief, but he's doing a bad job of it if he is.
"There's one other thing, before I let you two go home and get some rest after your flight."
"Anything, sir," Blake says. 'Sir.' I've never heard him call anyone that.
"I'm proud of you. It can't have been easy to stand up to your father like that. It can't have been easy to stand by your wife. But you did the right thing, and I wanted you to know how proud I am of you for that."
"Thank you," he says.
"I know I said just one more thing," he starts. "But there actually is one more after that."
Blake's eyes are misty, but his voice sounds solid as a rock. "What's that?"
"You two need to get started on grand-babies immediately, you hear me? Im
mediately."
I laugh. It's a relief to hear him say it. "I don't think that's going to be a problem, sir."
"Good," he says. "I prefer it that way."
I'm ready to go home. Blake says 'I love you' and hangs up, and pulls me into a hug.
"He says we need to get started on grand-babies."
"Then I've got some good news for him," I say, and laugh. Because we're way ahead of him on that front.
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